


Enterprise On My Mind

by AndreaLyn



Series: Hard Earned Rights [8]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Mind Reading
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-28
Updated: 2013-06-28
Packaged: 2017-12-16 09:35:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/860632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>McCoy never really asked to know every last thought inside Jim's head. He's getting it, though.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enterprise On My Mind

As a child, McCoy had been tested for psi-ability as part of the range of testing that was applied to all children his age. They were scored for their intellect (Leonard had been found to be advanced for his age and was immediately skipped two years after completing the necessary assessments), for their personality (which, apparently, could use improvement with every advent of the tests) and for latent abilities found primarily in other alien species. His psi-ability was low-level, but  _present_.  
  
This wouldn’t be such a problem except for the fact that they’ve passed through an ionic storm that, as Scotty says, is bound to kick up a lot of dust, dirt, and sparks.  
  
The sparks are currently trying to drive McCoy out of his mind what with the screaming and the hissing and the nonstop  _noise_  that he’s being subjected to. He’s having dinner with the bridge crew when they cross over the storm and suddenly he’s flat on the floor with the heel of his palm jammed against his eyes as he tries to stop the cacophony of noise from drowning him in its chaos.   
  
“Fuck,” he’s growling as he twitches and nearly spasms. He’s so close to losing consciousness and it’s only the fuzzy form of Jim kneeling over him that keeps him from slipping into that waiting and inviting abyss of darkness. He tries to fight through the sensation in order to understand what’s going on, but all he can recall is the briefing that says that certain members of the crew might experience vague discomfort.   
  
He feels Jim’s hands on him vaguely, as if they are the shadows of a fugue-state trying to worm their way into his presence. Jim’s gripping his shoulders hard, shaking him, and begging. “Bones,” Jim’s voice echoes in his mind. “Bones!”  
  
 _No, please, don’t, Len, please don’t. Not like this._  
  
McCoy blinks and tries to shake his mind of the echo there. He slowly comes back to himself and groans as he sits up, clasping hard to Jim and using him as a crutch. Jim’s three-quarters wrapped around his body and McCoy glances up at Jim with a pained throbbing shooting back and forth through his mind, like a vicious game of ping-pong. He winces and feels a nauseous rush trying to overtake him.   
  
McCoy glances around the table and blearily looks at the worried faces of the other crew. “S’okay, m’good,” he drawls, his voice slurred. If he doesn’t know any better he might have thought he’d just had a mild stroke. He feels another pair of strong hands on his arm and glances to his side to see Spock helping him into a sitting position.  
  
McCoy suddenly has the flash of a strong headache back and when Spock’s fingers glide over his neck, he  _hears_  Spock, really hears him.  
  
 _Doctor McCoy, do not struggle. Do not think this awkward given our past history and future possibilities. Calm yourself._  
  
“No, Spock, don’t,” McCoy can hear Jim snapping and growling with warning, but McCoy doesn’t have time to figure out that Jim means to stop Spock from exactly what he does.  
  
He pinches the precise spot against McCoy’s nerve that sends him into a deep, dark, peaceful oblivion. While McCoy is fully aware that nerve-pinch victims don’t dream in the abyss of their sleep, he swears he does and that he thinks of throttling Vulcans who leap before they look because they can blame it on a half-human side. He comes to with the bridge crew surrounding him and staring at him like he’s an exhibit at a zoo.  
  
“Fuck,” he curses immediately as he gets assaulted with a din of noise. If he focuses, he can hear Russian and Japanese in there, Vulcan thoughts piercing the veil, a mishmash of everything and…well, Scotty. McCoy’s not sure what he ought to term it, but he definitely can’t understand it.  
  
The one voice that comes piercing through is  _Jim_ , loud and clear.  
  
 _Oh, thank god, Bones. Wait, why are you looking at me like that? What did I do? I don’t have any stains on these pants, do I? Are these even mine? Shit, did I take your pants again?_  
  
And while Jim’s busy checking himself over, McCoy is rubbing at his forehead, trying to figure out exactly what’s going on and how to make it stop. Even if he can’t understand the majority of the other languages circling around in his mind, he feels as if they’re going to bring him slowly down until he’s drowning.   
  
He doesn’t see a reason to keep this hidden like a dirty secret and as soon as Uhura and Jim get him propped up and Sulu gets him some water, he adjusts so that the wall can bear him up. “I can hear everyone’s thoughts,” McCoy says, throat hoarse. “Without touch,” he adds, glancing up at Spock. The Vulcan seems to be doing his best to tune the world out, which says to McCoy that he’s experiencing something similar, but he’s got decades of practice at this. “If you have anything to think about me, I’d do it out of my vicinity.”  
  
He catches a small babble of something in Russian in his head before Chekov smiles anxiously. “Sulu and I will depart now!” he adds brightly, yanking on his significant other’s arm and pulling him out of the room. It quiets the field by two and McCoy looks around for Chapel and M’Benga, wondering why he hadn’t been hearing them.   
  
“Chapel?”  
  
“Went with M’Benga to medical to research potential palliatives to help you,” Uhura gently speaks, rubbing a soothing hand over his back as Jim brushes his hair off his forehead the way that McCoy likes it, his fingers cool to the touch. “Relax, Leonard,” she insists. “We’re here for you.”  
  
McCoy turns to look at Jim and tries to find solace. For all the years that he’s known about Vulcan touch telepathy, he’s occasionally envied them, but now he sits here knowing what it’s like and wishing that he didn’t.  
  
“Jim,” McCoy gets out with some difficulty.  
  
 _Anything, Bones, I’ll do anything, what do you need? Just tell me, I’ll do anything, please._  
  
“Take me to my room. And then stay in yours for a couple of days.”  
  
Jim looks as if McCoy’s just told him that he wants to break up, but he complies and his thoughts read loud and clear how unhappy he is with that and how much he doesn’t like leaving McCoy alone during this, but he helps him there and waves off the rest of the bridge crew as he accompanies McCoy down the lengths of the halls.  
  
“So you can hear my thoughts?”  
  
“Every one, Jim,” McCoy agrees with a heavy sigh as he listens to a dozen thoughts about apples, sex, the ship, the next mission, the last mission, the last time they had sex, Joanna, Jim’s mother, and the next shore leave. McCoy pauses at that, frowning. “Since when have I ever given you any inclination that I wanted shore leave in the Caribbean?”  
  
Jim glances at him, looking genuinely surprised. “That’s a pretty low-lying thought, Bones.”  
  
“Yeah, well, I’m picking up on it,” he sighs and wishes that he weren’t. It’s not as if he needs to see inside Jim’s brain to get to know him better and this is all too much like an invasion of privacy for him. They reach his door and McCoy leans heavily against it for a moment before leaning in to give Jim a goodnight and a goodbye kiss. The both are just temporary, but McCoy feels their current situation is occasion enough to mark it.  
  
 _Love it when you kiss me._  
  
“That makes two of us,” McCoy mumbles against Jim’s lips as he eases away. “And love you as I do, Jim, you’re giving me a headache. Talk to my staff and figure out how soon they can shake the ionic dust off me. You can still send me messages. We’ll talk that way. Okay?”   
  
“I don’t like it,” Jim says archly and pointedly.  
  
“I didn’t think you would,” McCoy concurs and gives Jim a light smack to get him going. “Go on, get out of here before you give me an aneurysm.”  
  
“You always say the most beautiful things,” Jim mocks lightly as he salutes and presses one last kiss to McCoy’s jaw, drifting back and away. He never once takes his eyes off of McCoy, as if keeping his gaze on a fixed point will somehow make the leaving all the less worse.  
  
*  
  
 _TO: Lt Cmdr LHM  
FROM: JTK  
Subject: Bridge  
  
Bones, I know you can’t come up here, but I’m dying of boredom on the bridge. I even finished my paperwork and did the staff evaluations I had stuffed in our sock drawer for the last three months. I’m sure that means something is wrong.  
  
TO: JTK  
FROM: LHM  
Subject: re: Bridge  
  
Jim, stuff it. I’m fighting not to fall over because I’ve got a migraine. And you wouldn’t believe the number of people who think about STD’s here.  
  
TO: LHM  
FROM: JTK  
Subject: re: Bridge  
  
Are you in sickbay? Bones, I swear to god, if you’re there…  
  
Okay, I just got off the comm with you. Are you an idiot? I mean, did we just switch traits having sex the other night? Bones, get out of sick bay and go back to your room where it’s quiet and I don’t have to worry about blood trickling out of your nose. And before you ask, that’s an order.  
  
TO: JTK  
FROM: LHM  
Subject: re: Bridge  
  
Just a few more hours.  
  
TO: LHM  
FROM: JTK  
Subject: re: Bridge  
  
Don’t make me withhold green collards and sex, Bones.  
  
TO: JTK  
FROM: LHM  
Subject: re: Bridge  
  
Fine. I’m going to my room. But it’s not because of your threat and more because M’Benga just had to staunch a nosebleed for the last five minutes. And before you say anything, if the words ‘I told you so’ come out of either your mouth or your brain, you’ll be getting denied physical gratification for a lot more than just a day or so. _  
  
*  
  
McCoy’s still making sure his nose has decided to stop bleeding when he makes the decision. Medical isn’t an option and he can’t chance the mess hall or the bridge where higher numbers of population threaten to knock him unconscious. Even now, he’s still feeling the remnants of pain in his head. It’s when his head is spiking with pain and he’s close to feeling as if he can’t take it anymore that he calls up Jocelyn on a hunch. She’s away from the phone because it rings about six times, but it doesn’t go to message so McCoy keeps on trying and waiting and hoping. She eventually slides onto the screen and smiles gently at him, crow’s feet appearing as she greets him with a musical ‘hello, Leonard’.   
  
It’s blissfully silent.  
  
McCoy can’t help but grin as he’s discovered that video-tech won’t allow his new abilities to work and it’s the best news he’s had all day because it’s suddenly wonderfully quiet as he encounters no one’s inner machinations but his own. For all that he’s envied Spock in the past for his ability to know people’s thoughts and emotions, for all that he’s wanted a byline to Jim’s mind, getting what he wished for has been everything but pleasant.   
  
“What’s the occasion?” Jocelyn is asking wryly, peeking around his shoulder as if she’s looking for some shadow that ought to be lurking around him. It doesn’t take a genius (though he could probably wander into the hall and come back with  _three_  if he needs to) to figure out that she’s looking for Jim. “You never call.”  
  
“I also never pick up the latent ability to read minds and here I am,” McCoy offers with a wry smirk. “It doesn’t transmit through vids. You were my last hope.”   
  
He hadn’t wanted to even attempt with Joanna on the mild off-chance that he  _would_  have been able to hear down to the depths of her deepest and most secret thoughts. There are some things that a father just does not ever need to know about his daughter.   
  
Jocelyn laughs at that, her low and genuinely delighted laugh as she leans back in her wicker rocker and scratches distractedly at her arm. “Why, Leonard, are you having troubles with the new boyfriend?”  
  
“He thinks a lot,” McCoy notes with a gentle laugh. “Put Jo on, will you? Now that I know this thing doesn’t hop and skip planetary lines, I want to talk to her.”  
  
“You got it. Now, Leonard, remember, when people think that you have a mean face, it doesn’t mean that…”  
  
“Off the line, woman,” McCoy interrupts her, but can’t help a broad grin in response to her words. He settles and waits amidst the low murmurs of a populated ship as Joanna complains off-screen that she hates her math homework and meanwhile she slouches into the chair in front of the vid-phone. McCoy’s grinning at her, unable to help himself. In the past day he’s heard some crazy things through his brain, but there’s nothing so stabilizing as a fourteen-year-old girl complaining about her math homework.  
  
“Hi, Daddy,” Joanna greets gently with a light smile on her face. “Don’t listen to any report cards coming your way,” she says seriously, a furrowed line on her brow. “My math teachers are just out to get me.”  
  
“Oh, is that it?”  
  
“It is,” she agrees fervently, fidgeting with the long-sleeves of her shirt, pulling them over her palm as she settles back in the chair, whistling for the dog. “Mom says you can read minds?” she asks, as if that’s something normal. It’s as if he’s gotten a haircut or changed boot-styles. “That’s pretty cool,” she admits thoughtfully, sounding (and looking) dreamy. “What’s on Scotty’s mind? Is it all engineering and these strange complex formulas that no one would ever understand?”  
  
“I’m not brave enough to try, Jo,” McCoy admits with a rough laugh.  
  
There’s a long pause between them and McCoy can tell that they’re about to launch headfirst at a difficult and potentially universe-swallowing question.  
  
“…what does Jim think about?”  
  
“Me. You. The ship. The future,” McCoy answers openly and honestly. He knows that keeping secrets from Joanna will never lead to anything helpful and that it’s not as if he’s about to tell Joanna about the ten various sexual fantasies that he’d written down from Jim’s brain during the day.  
  
 _And thank god she can’t hear my thoughts in turn_.  
  
Joanna’s face softens slightly and she rests her chin in her hand, staring at him as if she’s just waiting to say something that’s going to embarrass him for the rest of time. McCoy rolls his eyes as if in anticipation of such a thing and lets out a low growl at her, staring pointedly in turn.  
  
“Did he think the L word?”  
  
The one that’s still yet to be said, McCoy notes, at least seriously and since they’ve been together on the ship.  
  
“In his own way,” McCoy demurs to the question, tipping his head to one side. “Go back to your math, kiddo. I’ll talk to you tomorrow when the headache needs dying down again, okay?”  
  
“Will I really never make it anywhere in the world if I don’t pass calculus?” Joanna asks as she worries her lower lip, staring at McCoy intently and with genuine concern. “I mean, it’s just one subject and I do just okay. It’s the only thing I do just-okay in.”  
  
“You never heard this from me,” McCoy warns as he slowly rises to his feet, “but the importance of calculus in the general play of things is about the most miniscule thing you could imagine.” He offers a kiss pressed to his fingers and then to the vid. “Get some rest at some point.”  
  
“Okay, Dad,” Joanna promises softly. “Love you.”  
  
“I love you too. You go show that math who’s boss.”  
  
And with that, the connection goes dead. There’s static on the line, but no respite in McCoy’s head as the rush of voices returns and makes McCoy cursed the very existence of ionic storms and pilots who chart courses through them in order to shave forty-two hours from their journey.  
  
*  
  
In the end, there’s no avoiding it.   
  
There are certainties in the world that simply must be faced. These include the fact that the universe started in some manner (whether a mere coincidence or a long-planned party), the Earth is round, the worlds revolve around their sun, and Jim Kirk will find a way to burrow into McCoy’s life no matter the circumstances. It doesn’t matter if he’s testing off the charts in terms of his psi-level, it doesn’t matter that McCoy can hear the deepest thoughts of each crew member.  
  
Jim is there.  
  
It’s been three days since they went through the ionic storm and it’s been two days since McCoy sat Jim down, put a hand on his knee, got his eye contact and briefed him with the update about his condition as if he were telling a man’s family that he wouldn’t be seeing anything but the light. It’s been three days of  _noise_ , true and constant. It’s been three days in separate quarters and Jim’s respected him so far, but tonight is the night it all comes to a head.  
  
McCoy’s been sleeping with the quiet and dim hush of other voices in his mind (a hypospray to the neck had taken the volume off of it, for the most part), but suddenly the noise spikes and he jerks awake.  
  
 _Don’t wake up, don’t…shit. Sorry._  
  
McCoy rubs at his bleary eyes, sitting up and letting the covers fall into cascades of artistic chaos. He squints lightly and rubs his free hand over his shirtless chest, beckoning Jim over with a lazy signal. “C’mon and join me while you’re here,” he sighs and rearranges himself so that he’s only taking up half the bed and Jim can cocoon in his normal place. It takes less than ten seconds for Jim to wriggle his way into McCoy’s hold and they lie there for a long moment in silence before an onslaught on several levels takes hold of McCoy’s consciousness and nearly blacks him out.  
  
 _Couldn’t sleep without you…needed to have you with me…_  
  
 _I need you Bones, fuck, I’m terrified, how can I need you so much when it’s still so fresh. But I guess it’s not, we’ve been like this for so long. Bones. What am I going to do when I lose you? What am I going to do when you leave me?_  
  
 _Be mine, Bones. Doctor Leonard Horatio McCoy, be mine forever with your stupid middle name. Don’t ever leave me and don’t ever…ever…_  
  
McCoy nearly flinches in pain at the headache it’s starting to give him. “Jim, shut up, please,” he begs hoarsely. “Or think in another language for a minute, okay?”   
  
He seems to comply because the noise goes dim as Jim switches to an old dialect of French that he had picked up while he was a kid (something about loving the old movies, so the stories from his childhood go) and McCoy exhales deeply as he unclenches his fingers from where they’re wrapped around the blankets. He shifts, turning over in bed, and cups Jim’s cheek.   
  
“Thought I told you to stay away while my brain was a good candidate for dribbling all over the nice floors,” McCoy grunts out, but he’s not upset. Truth is that after his talk with Jocelyn last night, he had tried to sleep and just like the first night, he’d tossed and turned the whole evening and had endured some of the least restful sleep he’d ever encountered. He’d been keen to blame this on his ability to read minds, but the truth lies more in the territory that it’s been a long time since he’s been in an empty bed and he doesn’t know how to make that comfortable anymore.  
  
He and Jim may still be striking forward and mapping out this new territory, but apparently if they don’t bunk together at night, they’re neither of them going to get any rest.   
  
There are still odd little snatches of thoughts that McCoy’s picking up on. He’s starting theorizing that these are the base thoughts, the ones that people can’t prevent. Chekov’s are Russian, Sulu’s are Japanese, and Uhura’s are a beautiful mesh of a dozen different languages cobbled together to form one.  
  
Jim’s are English and McCoy hears them as if a heartbeat – every other word.  
  
 _…stay…me…with…forever…_  
  
McCoy closes his eyes and lets those odd heartbeat thoughts be his lullaby as he rubs circles against Jim’s hip, idly trying to lull the both of them into what can pass for sleep. The noise is still there, but he’s starting to manage it.   
  
“Scotty says the remnants of the storm clinging to the ship will be gone by shore leave next week,” McCoy speaks aloud as he feels the waves of drowsiness start to push in on him. “Chris, Geoff and I talked about it and we think it’ll fade away after that, so I won’t get a direct line into your head. So anything you feel you need to say before that happens, feel free.”  
  
Jim’s body feels like deadweight in his arms. It feels like he’s asleep, but he’s not. He’s clearly not because McCoy nearly gets knocked back with the force of one determined thought.  
  
 _Bones. I don’t need to say it. Do I?_  
  
McCoy knows the intricacies of Jim’s brain and he’s not sure he even needed the storm to help him through it. Every little turn in Jim’s history that ought to have been a surprise isn’t. The childhood’s not the best, but no one’s really to blame except possibly villainous Romulans. There’s a small stint on a distant planet that Jim won’t talk about, but when he does talk, he talks to McCoy and tells him the barest of details. McCoy knows Jim inside and out and so when Jim thinks  _that_ , McCoy already knows what he means.  
  
“No. And yes,” is all McCoy says as he wraps his arm around Jim’s torso and splays his palm over his chest, against his heart. He feels the heartbeat while he feels the sudden glow of Jim’s mind, as if the sun’s just come up on a new day.  
  
“Yeah?” Jim asks with a grin.  
  
“Yeah,” McCoy agrees with a quiet groan as he shifts the both of them to find a better, more comfortable position. “Hey Jim?” he asks, yawning deeply as he gets the words out. “You don’t need a byline to my brain to feel like you understand me at my basest level, do you?”  
  
“Father issues, ex-wife issues, daughter issues,” Jim rambles idly. “Future issues, blah blah, Spock loves you in some alternate timeline and I hate that and you hate that I hate that, you love me, you love medicine, you love Joanna, and you love this ship as much as you hate space and I stopped trying to figure you out right around the time that you started giving me sex as incentive to stop thinking about things.”  
  
Jim turns just enough so that McCoy can see him smirking in the dark light of space.   
  
“I know you inside and out, Bones,” Jim says as if that’s some fatalistic ending, but it’s just the beginning to McCoy. “Took me ages to get to that point, but here we are. I know you and you know me. And  _yes_.”  
  
“If that’s the case, go back to your little French coquettisms and let me sleep,” McCoy grumbles, even though he’s grinning as he presses a kiss to Jim’s neck (so the other man can most definitely  _feel_  the upward curve of his lips).   
  
When Jim falls to sleep, McCoy shifts and drapes one arm behind his head, staring at the ceiling.  
  
 _Shit_ , he thinks to himself and it echoes in his own head, like feedback reverberating heavily.  _Now what have I got myself into?_  as if he’s not in the deep waters and barely holding onto the lifeboat to begin with.


End file.
